


Should the dawn never come (of shadows and embers)

by Amazaria



Category: One Piece
Genre: Conversations, Gen, Platonic Relationships, Pre-Canon, The author's insistent feelings about being alone but not quite, The author's insistent feelings about the night of Wano, Wano Arc (One Piece) Spoilers, and my feelings about legacies, dawn/night imagery, this fic brought to you by
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-20
Updated: 2020-11-20
Packaged: 2021-03-10 05:29:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,143
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27648212
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amazaria/pseuds/Amazaria
Summary: She lets out a wry laugh. "I am a burden, is what I am," she counters. "To Kawamatsu before, and to you now. And for nothing I've earned, only the blood in my veins." Her hands curl in fists, wrinkling the delicate fabric of the yukata Denjiro gave her for her last birthday.Denjiro makes a low, wounded noise, and Hiyori wishes she could take back the venom in her voice, even if it was directed at herself. Hiyori wishes for her mother here, her father, anyone who could brighten the horizon. But there is only her, and Denjiro, eyes closed and regret painted in the tenseness of his expression."You are Lady Toki and Lord Oden's daughter, and I loved them," he says.(or: Hiyori and Denjiro, during the endless night of Wano. if we have nothing, we will still have each other.)
Relationships: Denjiro | Kyoshiro & Kozuki Hiyori
Comments: 5
Kudos: 33





	Should the dawn never come (of shadows and embers)

"Denjiro," murmurs Hiyori, as he steps into the room he's managed to secure for her. "Welcome back."

He bows to her a bit and she grimaces. But they've argued over the level of deference Denjiro owes her enough, and she lets it slide, perceptive enough to notice the way he holds itself a little lower today.

Reminding her that he technically ranks higher than her, these days, will only hurt more, and Hiyori is not cruel.

"Lady Hiyori," he murmurs in kind. His coat, she notices, is stained with blood. "I caught sight of Lord Yasuie, today."

"Oh," she lets out, some kind of grief making its way into her heart. Any anchor to her past that isn't the man in front of her is as good as dead, as good as gone, for her, now and until dawn comes. "He seemed well?"

Denjiro sags; he raises a tired hand towards his face, that he lets drop at the last minute with an apologetic glance towards her. Hiyori wishes he could let down all of his masks with her, for the thousandth time almost, but refrains from pleading. "Well enough," he settles on. He raises his head to meet Hiyori's eyes, and she doesn't mean to, but she must not work hard enough to hide her guilt, for he softens.

"Lady Hiyori-"

"I won't cry," she says, voice tenuous and hurried. "I won't cry, please don't worry about me anymore."

All people do is worry about her, when she is safe and cared for, has enough food to eat and a roof over her head. Her caretakers starve and drown themselves in lies, and they look at her like she has a right to be hurting. Hiyori is supposed to watch over her people, and instead she hides away in a darkened room and still wakes Denjiro up with her nightmares, try as she might to muffle them. A poor hope she makes.

Denjiro looks at her with the same quiet kind of care he always directs towards her. "Crying wouldn't be a shame," he states softly. "You are very strong."

She lets out a wry laugh. "I am a burden, is what I am," she counters. "To Kawamatsu before, and to you now. And for nothing I've earned, only the blood in my veins." Her hands curl in fists, wrinkling the delicate fabric of the yukata Denjiro gave her for her last birthday.

Denjiro makes a low, wounded noise, and Hiyori wishes she could take back the venom in her voice, even if it was directed at herself. Hiyori wishes for her mother here, her father, anyone who could brighten the horizon. But there is only her, and Denjiro, eyes closed and regret painted in the tenseness of his expression.

"You are Lady Toki and Lord Oden's daughter, and I loved them," he says.

The names, so often glossed over, hit her, and the tears she tried not to show finally win as she bites her lips. Denjiro smiles, gentle and so terribly sorry, and Hiyori grieves for him, and herself, and Wano, all at once. "I did not save you for the blood in your veins, and neither did Kawamatsu. I saved you because you are a child, and I had seen you grow up."

Hiyori curls into herself, refuses to hide her face in her hands.

"The dawn could never come," continues Denjirou, as steady as he can be even when giving shape to the worst of their nightmares, "and you would still not be a burden. You would be someone I love, and samurais protect their loved ones." He laughs, low and grieving. "Not that I am much of one, these days," and Hiyori remembers the blood on his clothes.

"We're making the best of a bad situation," whispers Hiyori. "That's what Mother used to say."

Denjiro nods. "Lady Toki was very wise," he agrees, voice hoarse, grief rawer than Hiyori's tonight. "And she was very kind."

But his voice sounds hollow.

"The dawn could never come," offers Hiyori, and it's Denjiro's turn to close his eyes in the soft lighting of the room's candles, "and there would still not be a day my parents wouldn't be proud of you, Denjiro."

The silence weighs heavy over the two of them. The deads' absence weighs heavier.

"Ah," manages to say Denjiro, and bows his head. Shadows play on his closed eyelids, on his face distorted by misery and guilt, and Hiyori wishes pointlessly for them to go away. But the dawn is not there yet, may never come, and its servants have learned to mold shadows in its absence. "You have inherited your mother's kindness."

"I am sorry, that I cannot be more help," Hiyori says in the silence. Denjiro has seen her breaking down hundreds of times already, will probably witness it hundreds of times more, but she has yet to see him drop his facade in front of her. "That I cannot be what my brother will be."

It weighs on her, as much as she tries to pretend it does not. She can only wait; *they* can only wait. Those who did not rest underground, in a field of unmarked tombstones, and she admires their courage sometimes. Surviving never quite feels honorable enough.

Her father had been a lot of things, but a coward he had not, and sometimes Hiyori can imagine him sneering at her.

"It is a heavy burden you bear, to be a symbol, the only surviving ember where your brother will most likely be the dawn," acknowledges Denjiro, emotions pulled back and reined in, eyes kind. "But you are more than what you represent, Hiyori," and her name devoid of any title feels odd in his voice.

"It should be I apologizing, for failing to protect your childhood. But," he smiles wryly, "you would not want me to."

"You have not failed," she says. This room, where remembering is allowed, where her name can be spoken, is proof enough. "This is enough- this is more than enough."

She gets gifts, for every birthday. Sometimes Denjiro sneaks her out and they go to the death place of her mother, and Hiyori can burn incense and cry and let herself remember a promise that seems more distant every day.

"All we have is each other, until dawn comes," she murmurs. "And shall dawn never come, it will still be the greatest kindness."

"But dawn will come," finishes Denjiro, and Hiyori looks at him, drowning in his shadows, staying afloat for her, infinitely kind; thinks of her father's people, her people now, starving in the streets, waiting; thinks of her mother's warm embrace, murmuring goodbyes in her hair, _dear heart, I never would have wished the waiting on anyone else_ , and says:

"But dawn will come. Or I shall bring back the sun over Wano myself."

**Author's Note:**

> this is what happens when the discord server you're in is willing to feed your hubris
> 
> (to the server: ily all)


End file.
